Pension and old people

PhylPho

Perhaps the capsule could be sent with the Winter Fuel Allowance in the guise that it's a vitamin pill. The Revenue always gets things wrong so nobody would lose their job over it.

Radiantsoul

RenovationMan wrote: »

How do we afford to keep these pensioners who have worked for 50 years but have not put anything away for their own retirement?

Quite a lot of people fall into that category. Especially those on low incomes.

nearlynew

Everything we regard as "good" like better healthcare, better housing, discouraging smoking etc makes the population problem - and by extension the pension problem - worse.

While all the things we regard as bad like war, famine, smoking etc actually help solve the problem.

ILW

RenovationMan wrote: »

How do we afford to keep these pensioners who have worked for 50 years but have not put anything away for their own retirement?

The BoE have just announced that they want everyone to spend all their savings to help the economy. Seems they are not in favour of people putting something away for their retirement. and will probably aim to just inflate them away, whilst keeping IRs at well below inflation. So not a lot of point really.

ukcarper

wherediditallgothen wrote: »

Eat them. But at that age the meat will probably need to simmer for a few days, so best to start it before you're really hungry.

Soylent Green

PasturesNew

RenovationMan wrote: »

How do we afford to keep these pensioners who have worked for 50 years but have not put anything away for their own retirement?

How do we afford to pay for the ones that have never worked? Or the ones that only worked 20 years?

If somebody's retired, that takes a younger person off the dole, for starters.

I haven't put anything away for my retirement because there's never been anything left over at the end of the mnth. Being a single female, not living/working in or near a city, money's been a bit thin on the ground mostly. And any I did have went into buying a house, then making it habitable.

abaxas

I would assume PAYE / work pension optout will become the norm.

Maybe everyone below 40 will simple decide to contract.

RenovationMan

PasturesNew wrote: »

How do we afford to pay for the ones that have never worked? Or the ones that only worked 20 years?

I wasnt saying we can. You were the one advocating early retirement to make jobs available for yonger people and I just asked how you thought this early retirement would be funded. So, how would it?

PasturesNew wrote: »

If somebody's retired, that takes a younger person off the dole, for starters..

If a doctor retires, does it mean that a younger person comes off the dole to replace him?

PasturesNew wrote: »

I haven't put anything away for my retirement because there's never been anything left over at the end of the mnth. Being a single female, not living/working in or near a city, money's been a bit thin on the ground mostly. And any I did have went into buying a house, then making it habitable.

I saw this on a different thread today. While I understand that times are hard now, it looks like this is a fairly recent thing:

PasturesNew wrote: »

I Overall, comparing all my incomes now, to 3 years ago, I was bringing in (from various sources) £35-40k/year, now it's more like £12k.

£35 to £40k is a lot of money for a single person with no dependants, surely you had surplus cash that you could have put into a pension in those days? I also read on that thread that you had sold a house and had a large STR pot? Could you not put some of this into ISAs so that if you buy a cheaper place, your surplus is held in a tax haven for use in retirement?

PasturesNew

RenovationMan wrote: »

I wasnt saying we can. You were the one advocating early retirement to make jobs available for yonger people and I just asked how you thought this early retirement would be funded. So, how would it?


If a doctor retires, does it mean that a younger person comes off the dole to replace him?

It works down the chain of jobs, so ultimately, yes.

RenovationMan wrote: »

I saw this on a different thread today. While I understand that times are hard now, it looks like this is a fairly recent thing:

I now can't see what you were referencing, so no idea what this is about until I've posted this again and gone back.

Edit: Ah, that's complex. But the nuts/bolts are: Spent over 20 years trying to afford a house, including living in a caravan and having an SO that got into NE and I had to pay that off, so started again, then finally was mortgageable for a brief period, bought a house that needed more doing to it than I could possibly have ever imagined, spent all my income for 6 months on essentials/fabric of the house, then dot com bubble burst and haven't managed to find even a half decent job since.

RenovationMan wrote: »

£35 to £40k is a lot of money for a single person with no dependants, surely you had surplus cash that you could have put into a pension in those days? I also read on that thread that you had sold a house and had a large STR pot? Could you not put some of this into ISAs so that if you buy a cheaper place, your surplus is held in a tax haven for use in retirement?

You're taking snippets and my story is complex. The £35k-40k was in reference to a few brief months when I had interest coming in and online earnings and some 'job' earnings. For a few months, before interest rates died and the work dried up and the online earnings halved overnight. A few months - during which time the money was saved.

I do have an STR pot. Some of it is in ISAs. I do plan to buy a cheaper place, but I've no idea how much and when. I will buy the right house when it comes along: maybe tomorrow, maybe 3 years. I can't predict when.

But, although I have some in ISAs now, they're my first ever ones because until I sold the house I'd never had two beans to rub together.

But, the way things are stacked at the moment, having those ISAs will be 'pointless' as they will probably equal, at best, what I would have got from Minimum Income Guarantee for old people .... and so I won't 'gain' from locking that money up.

mark5

I dont understand why the government reduced the number of contribution years to qualify for a full state pension?